


Howlers

by Damceon



Series: Character Backstories [1]
Category: Gamer Fiction
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-22
Updated: 2020-03-22
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:20:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23254609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Damceon/pseuds/Damceon
Series: Character Backstories [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1672036
Kudos: 1





	1. Chapter 1

All the good little boys and girls are sleeping, Babushka… dreaming their good little dreams, safe in their wage-slave-bought high-rise apartment suites far away from the slums… farther away from the world you knew, Babushka.

It’s nights like these, when the sticky, sour-smelling air of the plex is starting to churn in a stifled summer wind… these nights are perfect for the game. The wailing sirens and chatter of the trideo ads on every billboard fade into the background and all you can hear is the scream of steel horses in heat. You wanted me to learn the old ways… about Baba Yaga, the Golden Cockerel, the Fox and the Wolf… I remember the fables, Babushka… better than your daughter would’ve liked, I think. Father never knew what you taught me. Your daughter loves you very much, but even she was ashamed when she married Father.

I remember what you taught me… but my ways are not the old ways. There are new ways. Some say they are just as strong as the old ways. Some say stronger, Babushka. I have yet to see. But for now, these new ways are my ways.

Do you hear the cry of the engines? Do you know what the lust of the crowd feels like? To feel the speed deep down in your bones… the rush of adrenaline as you push yourself to the brink… always balanced on the razor’s edge… one nanosecond away from crashing… less than a heartbeat from twisted steel and burning wreckage snuffing what little life we have… and someone you don’t know screaming right for you, trying to take what’s rightfully yours…

I know I have to be clever, Babushka… clever and quick. Bears may be big and strong, but even they will starve if they are stupid. Life in the plex is wild and dangerous. Just like the wilderness you spoke of.

Mother was angry when I left school. Father was too busy with his own business to notice, perhaps. Mother thought I was leaving because of you, Babushka. Isn’t that strange? Why would I leave for you? You’ve been dead for four years.

…

I remember Father’s tattoo… isn’t that funny? He never talked about it, never showed it off. He wasn’t proud of the wolf-head howling at the moon on the back of his shoulder. It was good work. I never asked who did the ink. I just remember finding something similar in a shop and asking the artist about it.

Nordic symbolism, Fenris breaking free. I knew Father was from a mixed northern European family, but whatever pride he’d felt in his youth was long dead by the time I came screaming into the Sixth World. It’s amusing to think that deep down inside that drab, frowning exterior that slaves away every day in some cloistered office… there’s a slavering beast just howling and smashing against the cage he’s trapped himself in… looking for a way out… but he’s too set in his ways to try. Nah, that part of him is most likely dead. Dead and gone like his ancestors…

Between that and Mother’s love of wolves and dogs (she said it was about family, hierarchy… all that Old-World stuff)… I guess I was just meant to be a Howler.

…

Great-Grandfather, did you ever lose an arm? I can say that few people go through that kind of pain… fewer still do so willingly. I wasn’t willing, though it was through my own choices that it happened. Competing in this life is dangerous… especially if you’re not paying attention! I don’t regret entering the arena… I don’t regret the game… I don’t regret the ganger lifestyle that brought me here… I’ve got plenty of life in me, Great-Grandfather… your grandson, though… he’s just a walking shell. Least I could do is ignite the spark here in my blood… keep the old ways burning bright enough so you can see them from wherever you’re watching. Maybe you’ll see my Babushka there, too. She’s watching me, tonight.

…

“Did it hurt?” That’s got to be one of the stupidest questions I hear. Of course it fragging hurt! I lost my arm in a crash. Well, it wasn’t really “lost” so much as “mangled beyond repair or use”. There’s a reason they tell you not to wear loose clothes around moving parts and they put guards on drive-chains…

I remember everything feeling like fire, then my hand went numb… I could feel the tearing, burning, screaming pain all through my right side. The drive-chain of Franko the Mutt’s bike had shredded my upper arm to the bone, pretty much shoulder to elbow. I couldn’t stop staring at the torn meat and blood and bone, screaming the entire time until the stitch keeping an eye on us charged up and knocked me out cold. When I came to, I was in a greasy little recovery “room” and so pumped full of dope I thought I’d never come clean.

It’s a scary thing, looking at your doctored stump and bloody bandages… trying to force your fingers to wiggle… feeling the pain all the way down an arm that isn’t there… seeing this little nub shake with the effort as you start to sweat… and then, it doesn’t matter how much dope they put you on… they gotta put you to sleep to shut you up.

Had to sell damn near everything I’d managed to save just to put a working implant in its place.

But that was two years ago. Before I became a Howler.

…

Hangin’ with the Howlers is the best biz I’ve ever known. Bikes, babes… you name your vice, I can name your price… we’ve had our hands dipping in and out of all kinds of pots. Mostly, we’re into Combat Biking… but I do a little on the side with boys I met a few years back. I try to keep my head down most times, since there’s plenty-a muscle pounding the streets like their dick’s gonna fall off.

I’ve got a little chrome of my own, chummer… earned my scars in the arena and on the street. Plenty of boys think I’m small-time… two-bit… just a hood. They forget that the Howlers are animals lookin’ for prey. It’s about feeding time, little slitches… get ready, ‘cuz here come the hunters!

…

Dropping out of school and taking to the streets might not have been the good-boy thing to do, but I’ve fallen-in with a good crowd here. I studied, y’know? Learned the right way to stick a froggy chummer, if you know what I’m sayin’. I’m a fair hand at cracking skulls too, when things get hot.

Got the ghosts to talk to, when I get bored. Docs’ve said I’m hallucinating… but that’s just ‘cuz they can’t see ‘em. Spirits walking in your shadow kinda gives you perspective… like you never know who’s watching. But they don’t trouble me much… not like some jabby slitches looking to get split to the gills.

You gotta stay clever and quick… a fox ain’t any good without a tail, right? Always make the lame carry the strong, when you can. Babushka taught me that… right Babushka? Anyways, if you don’t fight like hell, you’re liable to be chewed all to ghoul-drek.

Dames is always tricky biz… Crazy slitches’ll gut you while they’re given you all they got… dumb slitches ain’t got enough ‘tween their ears to keep ‘em around for long before they risk your neck for some dumb-slitch drek… Pretty slitches are like a live grenade that everybody _wants_ to jump on, but will still kill the whole damn room!… and smart slitches are the most dangerous… nothing worse than a dame smarter than me… ‘cuz she knows something I don’t. And damned if she don’t want to use it to frag me over somehow.

My girl? Nah, she’s alright… not too pretty, not too bright and not crazier than me. She’s everything I need, plus a little on the side… she keeps her nose clean, right? She’s got some ink, but that’s the only needle she takes a liking to, scan? Best damn woman in the world, for me… only one little hitch…

She ain’t real. I guess talking to ghosts gets you to making phantoms to keep you company when you’re alone and whacked outta your mind. She got me through the worst bits, too… but she ain’t really there. That’s rough on a fella, y’know? Maybe there’s one like her out there that I ain’t met yet… or I already met her when she _was_ crazy or pretty…

Her name…? Heh, chummer… _never_ ask me about my imaginary girlfriend again, scan? I don’t like you that much. Frag, even if I did, it wouldn’t be enough to talk about her. She’s mine. Even so, I don’t want you tryin’ to be the competition.

…

When the squealing demons hiss smoke off the pavement and blast fire and sulfur out their hoop, you better hang on tight because they’ll throw your sorry hoop right into an early grave. You don’t pilot the bike, man… you ride the fragger. That’s why they call it like that. You ride it. It’s like surfing, or fragging your new crazy slitch for all she’s worth… The ride is like every drug-soaked erotic nightmare when your short-and-curlies are right over the razor’s bloody edge. You watch a thousand fools eat it around you, but if you give that demon the room… you’ll come out clean every time. Just watch out you don’t let him kick you… ‘cuz a demon’s tricky like that. And if you’re combat biking… man, don’t _even_ think you’ve got yourself under control… you belong to your wheels then, chummer. You gotta be one with that monster roaring against the road, else you’re gonna be thinking too damn much to swing a bat and you’ll catch lead pipe right in your face. That’s what happened to Scotty, but he don’t haunt me.

…

I know a few people around Europe. A chummer’s gotta know his way around and have a few friends in dark corners… else that chummer’s gonna get geeked quick. So, I keep my wits… keep in touch with a couple bodies here and there… grease a few palms in a few spots… Keeps things lively and keeps me breathin’.

I sure as _frag_ ain’t telling you who they are, chummer… Man, you one dumb sonuva-slitch. First you try horning in on my girl… now my partners? You’re cracked, tosser… serious cracked. I think all that blood’s rushing to your think-box… maybe you got a little too much, huh? Maybe you think you’re hot drek with a pocket full of scrip… but I think this shiny bit of metal don’t think much of you and my wallet’s greedy these days. ‘Sides, my bike could use a few new bits.  
  
That’s right, you better fraggin’ run… stupid-hoop slitch.

Frag.

…

It was a good bout tonight, Great-Grandfather. I was hungry like ol’ Fenris himself. It wasn’t enough to just win… I brained a couple fools during the match… and afterward… heh, their gang was kinda sore about the beat-down and wanted a word with the lot of us.

I had to geek a couple of ‘em. It was absolute panic and screaming and dying… something about taking a life really gets to me. Reminds me how fragile we are… how screwed-up everything is… makes me want to hide… makes me a little paranoid, maybe. A couple hits of this Coco-Loco will smooth me out just right.

Got a Dumb slitch comin’ over in a little bit (frag-for-hire, the best kind)… she’ll take the edge off the night, Great-Grandfather… Nah, I don’t mind you watchin’… Drek, y’all been watchin’ since I can remember. Just keep your lips shut this time, scan? Frag, not like I could really stop you anyway, but just try to leave me the frag alone for the night. Not every night I’ve got enough nuyen to cover _all_ my needs, know’mean?


	2. First Heat

\- A Tournament of the Streets

\- The First Bout

\- Celebrating

\- Making a little Extra

\- Enjoying a Big Payday

  
  
The scream of rabid fans, the roar of the bikes… and the Howlers… there’s no better thrill in the streets! When we heard about the expansion league qualifiers, we got all over it. Our first bout was with a pick-up team of bikers from nowhere. They gave us a run of it, but by the third round we were out for blood.  
  
I took a swing at a guy right there in the first few seconds… did a bootleg-kicker and hopped the rear wheel in the air… nearly took the fragger’s head off, but he slinked back all in the nick. Then Runt’s boom-boom goes off overhead and clears the skyway while our boy’s running laps with the flag. I was just turning my bike back around and revving the engine when I see Runt come flyin’ off the skyway down onto the minotaur in the other goalie position. Man, not even Dogpound is stupid enough to try and take that kind of hit! So Ol’ Wooly gets plastered all over the far wall and I’m gasping for air, I’m laughing so hard, when the flag plops into the goal and scores a win for the Howlers.

So we’re knocking back some good brews because the whole ‘burb is jumping in celebration… Runt’s wrenching away on his wheels ‘cause he did ‘em good on that mountain of a Minotaur but managed to walk away without killin’ ‘imself. Scoobs is throwin’ back suds like he’s still in the race, and China’s got this weird look on her face, but I’m just catchin’ me a good buzz and eyeing the local candy. Really, I’m thinking about Mama-Bear’s place… she’s got all the skirt I need, and tonight I got money enough for me and then some.

This greasy suit walks up, all smiles and sharkskin… Old Man says something about Loki and goes back to lookin’ weird-like at Scoobs, but Crone’s got other ideas… she plunks down right next to me and starts muttering about the suit… I can’t understand most of it, so I just laugh. I think she said he was a clever little bastard, but not near clever enough… and too clean, besides… but the Suit was talkin’ nice-like and smiling and then there’s gunshots across the park.

I can feel the booze goin’ to my head, right? But that ain’t gonna stop a speed demon like me when someone starts throwing nuyen on the table. Fifty large for a briefcase, says the Suit.

And like that, we’re all hot pavement and shrieking engines through this crowd. I had to shoulder a few slitches and gutter-punks outta the way… Bein’ the smallest on the team ain’t always a blessing, lemme tell ya… but at least I ain’t Ugly. Show’s jumping all over himself, trying to catch up to us, and Z’s at the front with Pup… China’s ridin’ piggy-back with Scoobs while Runt’s hollering at us about what the drek is happening. So I throw my leg over the Midnight and burn out like we do in the arena. This van’s got nothing on our wheels and traffic in front of it. We just slide right up behind, flowing through the wake like it’s nothing.

And their tail whips back with a fragging uzi! So I kick it up and fly a wheelie at him, _pang-pang_ goes the bullets across the belly of my beast and now I’m slotted off.

I take a swipe at him with those nasty claws I got with the arm, but he’s a slimy sonuva-slitch as I go whipping ahead of the van. The van takes a nasty idea into its head to ram me, but they don’t have the balls to keep up… then _boom-boom_ goes Runt’s thunder. Skitter-skitter- _crash_ , right? Well, Scoobs had hopped into the van and muscled the driver to a stop and grabbed the little payday box and we were cheezing it before the flashing wig-wags could even see the scene.

Howlers: 2, Posers: 0.

We get this big payday on a black cred-stick and that’s when we really start partying. I take the rest of my winnings from the bout and smooth on over to “Moonlight Teddy” to fill Mama-Bear’s warm little hands with nuyen and snuggle up to two of her girls for the night. Choice weed, too… Old Man’s smiling the whole time Crone’s just shaking her head… but I don’t mind… I’ve got ‘em outnumbered tonight and I’m feeling the wild side.

In the morning, Mama-Bear’s already got breakfast laid out for her “Best Cubs”… all of us what pays our tabs on-time and keep our biz clean with her girls. It’s a good spread, too. Mama-Bear’s always got good eats, no matter what you’re hungry for.

I know there’s a big fat pile of nuyen looking to get split and I know Runt hates it when I’m late… so I finish my plate and give my night’s bedmates a smile and I’m out the door at a run. When I get to the Garage, Old Man sniffs and says China smells like a wet dog or something… Crone clucks her tongue in the way she does, but I’m only seeing nuyen. It’s a good morning for V, pups… a damn fine morning.

Runt even said he’d pick up some things for me that I needed (with my scrip, a’course)… a new pocket sec (my last one got scragged in a street race) and radio headset for the races. I’ve got a few places I gotta go and peeps I gotta talk to… and we could always use more gear for the bikes, but Runt’s not as white-hot with a wrench as Veloci-Max. Crone clucks her tongue again and Old Man just laughs at me as I’m thinking of ways that’ll make all that shiny nuyen drain away too fast.

And I’m already hungry for the next match.


	3. Train Heist

Train Heist

Waking up at the Moonlight Teddy can be a strange thing. One pulse, you’re all warm and cozy inside your own skull, the next… you’re warm and cozy in a place full of the smell of incense, perfume, and sex. If you wake up alone, that’s pretty normal… you wake up next to somebody… either you paid extra or you’re about to. Sometimes I forget why, though.  
  
Runt told me to be at the garage in the bright… but I needed some grit in my gullet before I smoothed over there. The girls are always smiles over breakfast, and I had the euros to take one back to bed for the morning… but Runt don’t care for me being behind the time.

Chatter was for work, pay was in doodads… or widgets… take your pick. Job was a new briefcase, so new it was a pocket secretary… some pasty-faced slitch had run-off with some data what Runt’s chummers wanted back. Runt says ok, the pack follows Alpha. That’s how we roll. He tells Show, China, Dogpound, and Fennie to watch the shack and keep chill while the rest of us make lightning after this train.

I ride tag-along with Scoobs, with Runt, the Lady, and Pugs scoot their own wheels. Runt’s bike is all better from its run-in with Ol Wooly, but the scratches give me a mind it’s still limping on the inside.

Our Sugar Baby candy Pay Day is boarding a train that leaves tonight, so we peep him and follow behind. It’s a long, boring, sober ride across the vast nothing of the plex and the wilderness between enclaves. We keep eyes on the prize, but the money walks right out from under our noses until I take a little trip into the Looking Glass and follow his lame hoop back to his first-class cabin near the head of the train. Scoobs and I play nice for the goon-squad, but they don’t bite like I want ‘em to… so we don’t get to lay those slitches out… pity, they look like they might have some euros on ‘em.

Runt don’t want us to burn the train (on account of how we’re still inside, among other things), but we upgrade our tickets and follow our little candy cane. Pugs and I go after one of the Box-Car Bobbies while Runt and Z clobber another… Scoobs pops the door on Candy’s cabin and gets a snout-full of flashing dazzles. I hear grunt, tearing, and Scoobs snarling bloody wrath behind me while I’m dancing around Second Bob. Well, turns out Bob’s better with his baton and bare hands than Pugs and me put together… but Bob don’t know I’ve got two half-meter steel blades in my arm before he goes to thump me smart-like on the head.

That’s when figured out I was only funning around with him, but he just got all serious until Pugs sprayed him in the face with the fire extinguisher. I couldn’t stop laughing.

Time I finally stumble over to the cabin, Scoobs and Runt are all teeth and demands on our lucky pluck… with what’s left of a brick shit-house all torn and messy at the door. About then, the train’s slowing down and the car gets locked down. We’re close to the next town…

I’m waiting for a Bob to walk into the car so I can give him a face-full of fire-snuff chems, when Runt unhooks the rear cars. Then, same deal on the lead cars… so we come skidding to a stop and hop out… Boom-boom-crunch, sandwiched steel, slotted-off security and passengers, and we’re cheezing it on foot quick as you like.

It ain’t long before our pictures are all over the Matrix and local trids… Murder…. MURDER! I’ve geeked a slitch in the heat of a street-fight, but I never went into that train car thinking we were gonna kill anybody. It’s a little heavy, but seeing my face with no name or number in that WANTED frame… chummer, my blood was _screaming_.

We end up scattering on the way to a smugglers’ warehouse. Damn-near got my hoop nicked by the local Law, but after mussing his tire and then checking his reflexes, I ditched the slitch. A long-long ride later, we’re back in our home turf and laying low as we can. My cut for the deal was a buncha crystals… stuff I can make stuff with, if I ever get the scrip to put together a lodge proper-like. Z was asking me about it, too. Something about putting a lodge up with her just rubs me the right way… ‘course, my girl’s hackles were up when I thought about it too long. Maybe…

It don’t matter, though… we’re celebrities now, baby!


	4. Big Time

-Back to Back Meets

-Prison Break for How Much?

-Smash ‘n Grab

Doing Bruiser work for Mama-Bear is always rewarding… I mean _always_. Even if you get your hoop handed to you in the scrape, she’ll patch you up and send one of her girls ‘round to tend your ego. I usually get the better end of a row… mostly ‘cause everyone thinks I’m a few laps short of a race and they don’t want to see how far outside the wall I’ll put ‘em.

Well, the ten-day came and went in a flash… news trid and local chatter was red-hot for the first two days, then the mummers washed in and everything got swept under the rug by the next big media blitz. Sometimes, it’s nice being nobody. I mean, I’m a Howler and I’m damn proud of it… but I’m not tagged like these corp slitches that gotta suckle the teat of their callous corp sow!

Tasha, one of Mama-Bear’s girls that is real good with massage, gave me a thorough rub-down last night before tagging out and letting Minka take over. That wily little bit of female seems just as like to rip your throat out as look at you, but if you cred is good…

Then Runt wakes me up at 10 a.m…. some fragged-up drek about a meeting at the garage. I can still smell bacon and legs… breakfast and bed hanging in the air like steam in the shower. I think I told him I’d be there, but I’m not sure.

…

I’m catching a slow buzz at the shop, tweaking loose bits on the Midnight to keep it running smooth when Scoobs tells everybody he’s got a meet to go to. Probably some in-heat bitch of Dog-Pound’s. We rag him as he struts out the door, waving it off ‘cause he knows more’n we do.

When Runt says, “V, get yer hoop over here, we’re talking.” I pop up from the bike and about fall over one of Pound’s little babies. Fraggin’ beast of a mastiff, all shiny coat like it’s been oiled and it just looks at me like, “Watch where you’re walkin’, chummer. You got meat fer legs.”

Runt takes us all to this classy little Vory place… can’t remember the name, but that’s for the better I tell myself. Scoobs meets us outside and smiles all teeth to the line waiting outside. So do I, but just so the muscle-heads don’t think Scoobs ain’t bein’ friendly. Runt says to me, “Take Scoobs over t’ the bar and keep your wits.”

Natch, Runt… so I’m all biz.

Highlights… we do two meets that night, I got into one row with a fella outta the Nordlands, Scoobs did some fiery shots to entertain the crowd, and we take two jobs from two different bosses. First job is a cinch, we smash down some doors, rough-up the local rent-a-wrecks and nab some back-up tapes in this building somewhere in the Plex.

Second job, not so simple. The Vory need a slitch pulled from a prison camp where everybody’s just a number. They give us a run-down of what they know, but they’re slim on juice so it sounds like they want to set us up… but Runt’s in good with these blokes, so I keep my hackles down and soon I’m only seeing Euros. One Million. That’s the pay for pulling their friend from the cooler, plus they’ll put us up in luxury accommodations for our time inside the slam. I’m tickled to hear it when Runt starts talking… I want the money… I could be set for a while with that kind of cred.

Of course, the Old Man’s laughing at me and saying how fast I’ll blow it and be broke or dead before I make it a year on my share… _if_ we survive the job. That makes me cold inside, but the Crone’s got that wise wag of the head and cluck of her tongue, talking about how to fool a wolf or steal the moon… one of her damn fables.

We take both jobs, though. And I’m ready for the smash and grab. Runt asks if we know anybody that can help with the other job, like a decker or somebody with a whole spider-web of connections.

“Mama-Bear.” And I didn’t even realize I’d said it until everyone was staring at me. So I take Runt to go see Mama-Bear at the Moonlight Teddy… and she knows somebody. Red Cap.

Red Cap isn’t very nice, but he likes the idea of a big payday as much as the next chummer. So I blind him with Euros before he totally loses interest. That’s usually how I gotta deal, flash more credits than their ego will let them walk away from… unless I got them by the short hairs, then they’re my slitch anyways.

So we get Red Cap in on it, but Runt’s not real happy… because I spent most of our front-money in promises… well, we gotta _do_ the job, first.

But that’s a couple days, yet.

We gear up and roll out for the smaller job… the noisier job… and we’re thunder down the streets, lightning… we’re wolves and demons and meta-flesh all rolled into one big wall of danger… blasting through the gate, crashing down the front door and moving two low-budget security guards, Scoobs is leading the pack like a berserker. My tires squeal a little on the floor of the hallway, nothing I can’t handle… but I haul out my long-arm at the top of the stairs as everyone else plows down the well…

And strobes go off… big, frag-off nasty strobes that blind me and make me sick… I can’t see, can’t hear over the wail of the alarm, and my guts are twisting in me. Couldn’t even hit one of the strobe boxes for the first couple shots, but then I smoked ‘em all… heard the motors down below and sirens well-off in the Plex. Scoobs reaches the top of the stairs and I greet him, he’s already howling victory so we haul hoop outta there.

It’s a good bit of work, and Plex security couldn’t even smell our tracks by the time they got there. We all cheeze it back to our hood and smooth back to the garage… Fennie managed to get lost along the way and took more than an hour to catch up to us… but he’s a weird one. We call him Fenris because he thinks he so big and bad, but the name was more a mockery to start. Don’t get me wrong, every Howler’s dangerous… but Fennie’s a princess, too. He don’t like doin’ things that’ll risk his hide even though he don’t mind getting his mitts dirty. Old Man laughs we I tell him about Fennie… Old Man’s the one that told me to call him “Fennie”, too. Crone laughed when I explained it to her… not sure why, though… she won’t say.


	5. A Brand New V

\- The Crash

\- Running from Shadows

\- Leaving Europe

\- Landing in Seattle

\- A New World

Runt got me smashed on the best Kind we could get quickly and the grimiest engine cleaner you could get at the local watering hole… so I don’t really remember getting clapped in irons. Scoobs made sure I only smelled like a dead rat‘s ass, instead of a sweat-stained bitch when I sobered up… and the head-ache when they hauled me into the transport made the Old Man wince. I swear, I’ve never been more happy to see those two shaking their heads at me like I didn’t know what I was doing was fragging nutz like a squirrel with a hand grenade… but Scoobs nudged me toward a wall of the cattle car and pointed.

“Mage there.” But I couldn’t very well see over the crowd like him… just looked like another chummer on his way to the Stinking Hoop-Hole of the Siberian Wilds Retreat.

So I walk over and play nice-nice… I give him a dose o’ “The PLAN”… then he goes and hides at the back of the car.

I can’t even tell how long we were there… but it was a fraggin’ slaughterhouse when we crawled out of that crock-pot of bodies and pieces. I swear to all my ancestors and descedants (if I ever have any)… I don’t _ever_ want to get on one of those trains again. The Old Man… he’s just laughing his hoop off while the Crone’s got this weird look in her eye like she’s staring through me… nothing to say from either of them while I’m trying to pull it together so Runt’s plan works the way he wants.

Then, we get to the site and the engine wrecks with a mighty BOOM. There’s fire, there’s alarm, there’s screaming and yelling and lights… but it’s all walls and fences and purposeful. Fire’s not spreading the way we wanted… defenses and guards aren’t panicking the way we’d like… and Runt says two magic words we’ve all been itchin’ to hear since the job started.

“Cheeze it!”

And we’re gone. I let my wolfie-beastie lay into someone by the tent city… but he’s on his way home before we’re even two hundred meters the opposite direction.

Running away with our tails between our legs like that… I tell you, I ain’t proud… but I’m breathing, fragger. Old Man was scowling, but Crone just nods her head and rubs that pointy chin of hers like she’s waiting for something.

Hiding in the mountains like that… it was revelatory… but crazy just the same. I think I was high for half of it, because I don’t remember most of that month. Getting lean the hard way, as it was.

We hit Moscow in the wake of the Next Big Thing… Crash 2.0, they call it now. A spirits’-fraggin’ miracle, I called it. We crossed borders, ditched Vory gear and sleazed our way home without so much as a cough or sneeze in our direction. The shop was still standing, but the whole gang had holed-up there with all their meager possessions. Not quite so thin as the lot of us that just trekked in from Hell’s Frosty Bollocks, but they didn’t look better than miserable with the state of things. Surprised to see us, and that might’ve been the highlight of their day.

Runt knows there’s no coming home proper-like, so he tells us we’re gone. Bunch of us died on that train, and that’s the way it’s gotta be. Runt’s got a way of yanking me around by the hackles like that. Gets the blood flowing and fired for war… then says we cut and run when it felt like we were stayin’ to fight. I don’t mind it after, since my hide’s still intact. After what I seen the Vory do to people what “disappoint” them, I don’t want ‘em to ever find me. Let ‘em think I died on that train. Last two people I knew in the Plex won’t miss me long enough for the Vory to notice.

And then we ran.

“Seattle!” Runt declared, and we stormed off into the great wide world without a backward glance. Mama-Bear had given me a more than motherly kiss goodbye and the name of a few blokes she knew along the roads to help me wherever I decided to go… Veloci-Max just stared at me when I told him he could have the bike back…

“You don’t _want_ it?”

“Nah, Max… don’t get me wrong.” I tells ‘im. “That there demon’s a screaming wet dream of a bike… but I can’t take it with me. Dead men disappear in the mist, not on the back of a steel dragon.”

He looked at me funny like he always does and shook his head.

“I honestly think I might miss you, V.”

“Not for long, I hope.” And I walked away… that was worse than leaving Mama-Bear’s girls, I’m telling you.

…

The roads out of Europe proper weren’t smooth, but the lights are always pretty. I even met a couple new ghosts, but Old Man and The Crone still got my back through thick and thin.

Gypsy’s a weird one, always talking in riddles and songs, like she don’t want Crone to understand anymore than me, but Walker’s never said a peep. He just stands there, lookin’ at the world and sniffing at things and acting like he’s more Howler than I am. Sometimes, he points something out… usually takes me a minute to figure out what he’s getting at since he don’t talk, but it’s stuff like; “Oh, look at this lit cigarette in the ashtray.” or, “Hey, what about that guard walking this way?” Gypsy’s the one that kept telling me about my girlfriend… and that worried me more than a little.

…

“V, I’m not gonna tell you again. _Leave it._ ” Was the last thing Runt said about her, and I didn’t feel like swallowing blood, so I dropped it. Turns out, Gypsy was right in a peculiar way.

_Fish can’t fly in a sea of grass_. It took me a little hindsight to figure it out, but when I was looking at the wanted postings Runt had printed out, I realized the verse hadn’t been directed _at_ us. We weren’t the fish. We were wolves in a sea of grass… and the local toughs were fish out of water… they weren’t playing nice-nice and they weren’t gonna last.

And that’s about when Seattle saw the first fledgling steps of New Sparta. That was a bloody homecoming.

Of course, that’s where Gypsy lead me to my doom.

I didn’t think Shayna was real, either.

…

Seattle’s a rough place to try to get acquainted with. The streets bend backward on themselves all over the place, and construction’s always moving them. Gangs sport colors like back in Europe, but so different from thug to thug that it’s hard to tell who’s with who until they’re both trying to stomp on your face. The one thing that was constant for the Howlers was: speed. The one thing constant for me was the Howlers. Everything else was changing almost too fast for me to keep up. I’m batty enough alone, but when the world went Augmented, I got close to losing it. Runt thought maybe I should start taking some serious drugs for my hallucinations, but the few I’ve tried haven’t really helped. Well… _“help”_ is relative. I don’t want to be a vegetable. Can’t feel the wind if I can’t feel.

I don’t think I slept for about a week out of each season the first year we were in Seattle. That didn’t help me any, and I didn’t help Runt’s mood. I’ve got a new scar on the left side of my forehead where Runt had to crack me one with a tire iron or something… I don’t remember that day at all. Just what Runt told me. He had that, “Sorry I had to beat you senseless, but you made me.” look in his eyes.

Gypsy sings to herself, Walker sniffs the air, Crone clucks and shakes her head while Old Man stares at me like he wants to punch me in the face.

I went out for a walk.

Then I found a bike and decided to go for a ride. The punk shining on his girl didn’t even notice until I revved the engine and squealed rubber out of the parking lot.

_Daylight’s Decadence in the Den of the Damned._ She wouldn’t shut the frag up with that. Over and over again…

“Digital Decadence” in bright neon on the side of the road.

I pull off the interstate and drop the bike a couple blocks away for a closer look walking.

Fear. That’s what I’d call that feeling. You never expect your hallucinations to tell you anything, or really be helpful or interact with the world… but I’ll be damned if Gypsy didn’t seem to do just that. See, the Barrens have a bad reputation in Seattle… Redmond might have other boroughs, but the Barrens are the Den of the Damned… and Digital Decadence is a little sim-sense shop on the outskirts, pimping erotica on the bleeding edge to the wretched and wealthy bold enough to enter with scrip and certified cred-sticks in hand.

My English isn’t very good, but the pictures tell me everything. Angels, Demons, sunlight streaming over a roman-gothic orgy scene… all blurred by that lovely mosaic pixilation and black spots of censorship…

My heart’s in my throat as I open the door… I swear it’s creaking like an alarm and the inside is deathly quiet. Shayna’s standing, in the flesh, at the far end of the counter twirling one finger through her wavy auburn locks and chewing on her lip while she flips through data-streams on her pocket secretary before looking up at me with a lazy, “you’re nothing new” dull glance. She doesn’t even bother with a greeting. I can’t even believe she’s there at all… but Walker’s eyes light up and he walks right over and leans in for a big sniff of her perfume… perfume I’ve known since I was old enough to understand what it _meant_.

I’m across the floor and half-way over the counter, reaching for Walker’s neck before she or I realize what’s going on…

“What the _frag_ , man?!” And she jumps back, nimble as always.

“Shayna, I’m sorry… Walker just…” but we both hear it. I didn’t think she was real until today.

“Ghost and spirits…” She’s getting red, the angry face I know. “Who the hells are you?”

I step back, full-on panic mode.

“Not real… you’re not real.” I’ve never been so scared in my whole life. The girl of your dreams… the _imaginary_ girl of your dreams… you’re _never_ supposed to meet someone like that. She’s got this look on her face like she’s half excited, half angry, and half scared… only Shayna could do that… but Shayna was never real before today… she didn’t have to follow the rules of reality… she was a dream… dreams…

But she had me backed into a corner, standing like I’d turned to stone but I feel ice cold and I know I’m shaking. I’m babbling in Old Norse and she’s just staring at me, shouting to someone over her shoulder about “crazy”… but I’m losing it. Walker’s sniffing at me and looks bored, Gypsy’s humming and playing with her skirts, Crone’s sighing and prattling about something only old women understand… and Old Man’s waiting near the door to the back, his hands clasped around a big fraggin’ sword. Like he wants to kill somebody…

Three guys come out of the back, my mouth snaps shut and Old Man takes a swing… nothing happens as the blade goes right through these guys like they’re smoke… but Old Man’s the smoke and I’m the mirror… the room’s too small for fire… Shayna would get hurt…

Next thing I know, I’m on the pavement, three guys kicking me from every direction while I flop around like a fish out of water…

And the world explodes.

It wasn’t as nasty as I’ve done in the past, but I wasn’t all there and I’m damned lucky for it. It was enough to startle them away from me, though. I flash to my feet, swirling smoke and burnt hair as the blades spring out of my arm.

“Do that… again.” I smile. Walker’s pointing one of them out… the weakest… the fastest to break… Old Man’s got his hands resting on the strongest’s shoulders, shaking his head knowingly. Crone is clucking her tongue and scolding the lot of them while Gypsy’s wailing about the Moon kissing the stars goodnight…

I call the Beast… the Wild… the Monster that hides at the corners of my imagining… the Wolf that devours dreams and runs through the heavens where men once dreamt there were gods… what little sense my brain can manage when I reach into the Beyond for help and what actually answered, I couldn’t say. But they ran.

Shayna cowered by the door, no longer urging them on… afraid of me. I’m standing, but only because I’m a wolf in man’s skin. The spirit leaves, it’s duties more than fulfilled. I shamble toward Shayna, the frightened rabbit too terrified to move.

So I kiss her. I imagined it being everything I ever dreamed, but it was every bit as clumsy as my injuries could make it. Still, the pain just made it that much more real. I could smell my own burns, taste my own blood mixing with her fear and the sweat of our skin… the perfume of her hair… the reek of the alleyway… the gasp of breath as we both struggle for air and the grating pain…

When I can’t take it anymore, I let go of her and walk away. I told myself I’d never go there again.

I haven’t.

That didn’t stop Shayna from finding me.

So she had a few of her friends beat the hell outta me.

Then she had her way with me, right there in the street. Rutting like wild animals. It’s difficult not to respond to that kind of intense desire. It’s hard to resist a woman you’ve known for years, even if you only met her a few weeks ago… some call me crazy… Shayna calls me “Three-V“. That’s good enough for me.

…

About four months ago, I met Erik when I was having a look at a local motor-bike show and rally… he had some good designs, good displays and a whole lot of Norse-inspired ink. Walker and Old Man seemed to take a liking to him, even if Crone didn’t seem impressed and spirits if I know what Gypsy’s on about until well after the fact. So I chatted him up for a minute, careful to not let too much crazy out at once… but he saw through it enough. At least he respects my patronage of his shop. His crew doesn’t really seem to like me much, but that doesn’t matter so long as he keeps letting me buy from him.

…

In all, I think I’ve made a nice home for myself here. The Howlers are settling in well. The racing circuit is crazy hot, the streets aren’t paved with nuyen but it’s pretty damned close if you’re sharp and keep your eyes open. I still have a little trouble with the layout, since the new AR came out, all the blinking lights and signs blur together for a whole lot of white noise when I’m riding. Most of the time, I just ignore the world… unless Shayna calls looking for a race… we’ve left the fist-fights out of the mix, but we’re still wild animals when the mood strikes. The crew just asks that I keep it out of the direct public eye. A few near-scrapes with the local police drove that point home well enough… and Shayna’s crew look at me funny whenever I’m in her area so I try not to hang out there a bunch. They do have good weed, though.


End file.
